t r- 



NKW AND VALLAULE BOTANICAL WORK. 



^ 



variety wliilo eonvjilesccnt, jrrcat couveuicnce for bathiiij^, and speedy cominuni- 

 catiiin with the servants, without at any time interfering with the more public 

 rooms or lialls. The Ijuikling is to be coated externally with stucco in imitation of 

 stone, with sills, lintles, and arches of brown stone; the basement is of blue 

 stone, and the underpining, where exposed to view, is brown stone. Thorough 

 ventilation is ensured to every room by means of shafts in the hollow wall, which arc 

 afterward carried to a large ejector on the roof, and that is encased in appropriate 

 wood work. The rooms which have no fire places are warmed, along with the other 

 parts of the building, with hot air. The vestibule is to be laid with encaustic tile. 

 The bouse is to cost §10,000. 



NEW AND VALUABLE BOTANICAL WORK. 



Nothing has hitherto been made public so well calculated to impress the mind with ad- 

 miration of the Himalayan vegetation as a thin fulio volume* by Dr. Hooker which has 

 just appeared. During his residence in India the author became acquainted with the 

 late Mr. Cathcart, a most zealous amateur, who had formed at a great cost by means of 

 native artists, and a corps of Lepcha collectors in his pay, a very extensive series of 

 drawings of the vegetation that surrounded him. His residence is described as a sin- 

 gularly beautiful spot about 1000 feet below Darjceling and GOOO feet above the sea, 

 occupying a mountain spur overhauging the steep furest-clad gorge of the great Runjeot 

 river, 5000 feet below, and descending in steep jungly slopes on either hand. " Through 

 these forests he had caused the natives to cut paths, directing all their operations with 

 all the taste and judgment of an experienced and skilful landscape gardener. These 

 openings led through the tangled jungle and wound amongst tall trunks of giant 

 timber trees, which were clothed with climbing Palms, wild Vines, Potlios, Hodgsoitia, 

 and Ipomcea, and laden with masses of Orchids and Ferns, suddenly emerging on emi- 

 nences commanding views of 200 miles of snowy mountains, rising range behind range 

 in dazzling beauty, and again descending by zigzags to cascades fringed with Ferns and 

 Mosses, and leading thence along the margins of rippling streams, overshadowed by Tree 

 Ferns, Bamboos, and wild Plantains." Surely this must be a scene in Fairy land ! In 

 such retreats were collected the materials out of which has been made the selection of 

 drawings now laid before the public ; aided, however, by Dr. Hooker's own sketches and 

 reduced to an artistic form by the inimitable pencil of Mr. Fitch. Of the merit of the 

 plates it is difficult indeed to speak too highly. Undoubtedly they are the finest tliat 

 have ever yet been prepared by any English artist ; nor arc they in any degree inferior 

 to the drawings of the celebrated Austrian Bauer. 



The high price of the work unfortunately places it far beyond the reach of many pur- 

 chasers; We shall therefore be doing our readers a real service by bringing before them 

 a short account of such of the plants as appear to possess the greatest horticultural in- 



* "Illustrations of Himalayan Plants," chiefly selected from drawings made for the late J. F. Cathcaut, Esq., 

 Bengal Civil Service. The descriptions and analysis by J. D. IIooker, M. D., F. K. S. The plates executed 

 . Fiicn. Folio. Reeve, bl. 3s. 



